Record number of DuPage County voters cast ballots on first day of early voting

Voter turnout on the first day of early voting in DuPage County exceeded the record set in the 2020 General Election, according to a news release from County Clerk Jean Kaczmarek.

A total of 1,533 voters showed up at the polls, more than twice the 660 voters who cast ballots on the first day of early voting four years ago.

“While it’s too early to make predictions, it appears that DuPage County is on track to have a large turnout for this presidential election. There’s excitement in the air,” Kaczmarek said in the release. “In 2020, the turnout was 76.55% with 491,067 ballots cast—the largest turnout in DuPage history.”

In recent years, DuPage County has had the highest voter turnout in the region in every election.

“Four years ago, there was a huge line of voters winding around the (DuPage County) Fairgrounds unpaved parking lot most of the day. Until 2020, voting this early was never very popular here,” Kaczmarek said. “We expanded our earliest voting sites from one to five. This expansion, along with state-of-the-art 100% paper ballot voting equipment has made it much easier and quicker to process voters. No one was waiting in a long line today.”

Early Voting locations are at the DuPage County Fairgrounds in Wheaton, the Addison Township Office, the Bartlett Community Center and the Naperville Municipal Center. Specific days and hours of all early voting locations can be found at: Voting Information (dupagecounty.gov)

“We’re providing optimum access to DuPage’s 623,326 voters, including vote-by-mail, permanent vote-by-mail, 24 early voting locations open on Oct. 21 and 250 polling places on Election Day, Nov. 5th, with the option to vote anywhere.”

Kaczmarek encouraged anyone who is uncertain of their voter registration status, including those voters who may have moved or changed their name since the last time they voted, to confirm their registration and view their sample ballot at the Clerk’s website: View Sample Ballot (dupagecounty.gov)